


Lady With The Spinning Head

by wave_of_sorrow



Category: Sherlock Holmes (2009), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Abusive Relationship, F/M, M/M, Miscarriage, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-08
Updated: 2010-07-08
Packaged: 2017-10-10 11:03:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/99038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wave_of_sorrow/pseuds/wave_of_sorrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She is temptation personified. Catching Holmes' attention as mischief sparkles in her eyes and emeralds glitter around her neck.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lady With The Spinning Head

She is temptation personified. Catching Holmes’ attention as mischief sparkles in her eyes and emeralds glitter around her neck. Dancing around him, around the law, in eloquent circles, laughing as she twirls and skips. Ivory skin that gleams in the moonlight and scarlet lips that part in a predatory grin to reveal snow white teeth. Avoiding knives and dodging bullets as she builds an armour around her heart. It is all a game to her. And one she plays well. The world is a sapphire in her hair, curls spinning in dizzying circles around her face. She throws her head back, revealing the tantalizing column of her throat, adorned with yellowing bruises, laughing, as he asks her to stay. Watson watches and says nothing.

  
It is not the last time he asks her. Yet she always leaves. Vanishing in a rustle of satin and lace and a waft of heavy perfume. Slipping through Holmes’ fingers like apparition. Leaving no trace behind save a sadness in grey eyes. Reappearing in the dead of night, a bright star in the darkness, blood trickling down her cheek. Luring Holmes into her orbit with a tilt of the head. Carefully painted nails transforming into vicious claws if she wishes so.

  
Her eyes stop to sparkle then and diamonds crown her head. A protective hand placed on her barely protruding stomach. Her laughter is hollow as purple imprints mar her delicate wrists. And still she whirls and twirls, all spinning colours and flashing jewels. Holmes’ pleas fall on deaf ears, pearls and rubies hooked throw their lobes. She hides the lines around her mouth behind an ornate fan. The circles beneath her eyes darkening. The scars on her body telling stories no one was ever meant to hear. Her skin is stretched tightly over her collarbones and her pale cheeks are sunken. Holmes reaches out and she laughs into his face, shaking hands carefully placed on her thighs. Dancing her dangerous tango around him, winking knowingly at Watson.

  
Her eyes, once sparkling with millions of stars, have turned to onyx. As if all the darkness she had seen had eclipsed her light. When Holmes looks into them now, he sees only himself. Her smiles become rarer and rarer still, blinding flashes of light. Gone too quickly to be seen. And still she waltzes around him, around them, smiling all too knowingly at Holmes’ hand on Watson’s arm. She plays her dangerous game. Coming so close to losing more than once, but never faltering in her steps, never breaking her rhythm, always spinning and twirling, always in motion, never stopping, never slowing, pulling aces out of her sleeves and throwing them out carelessly. Lady Luck is on her side.

  
Holmes contents himself with watching her from afar, collecting newspaper clippings and taking notes about her crimes. Watson watches and says nothing, knowing that Holmes will come back to him just like she always comes back to Holmes. Yet even as Holmes’ head rests on Watson’s shoulder in the night, Watson knows Holmes’ heart is trapped in a golden locket around her fragile neck.

  
One day she will slip, her step will falter, and she will fall. One day there will be no more aces up her sleeve. One day Lady Luck will turn her back on the dancing woman. One day she will lose at her own game. Her tears will turn to diamonds on her cheeks. Her blood will flow like liquid rubies, a flash of colour in a grey city. One day she will realize that she should have stayed. And it will be too late.

  
Holmes will not mourn her, refusing to believe that she is dead. He will wait for her return until Watson leaves him too. Only then will he realize that he should have asked him, and not her, to stay. And it will be too late.﻿


End file.
